Twitter is the crushing revelation that brevity isn’t the soul of wit.
Dispatches from the wilds of Proseambique – Blood and Stone
Exciting news! I just received the mock-up of the cover for my forthcoming novel, Blood and Stone. Check it out!
They’ve also finalised the blurb:
Like everyone in the word-puzzle world, Ogden Lylesmith was shocked by the brutal murder of Horatio LeSprat, the reclusive genius responsible for some of the finest brainteasers ever made. So when, two days later, he received a letter from the dead man – a man he had never met, containing only a half-finished crossword, Ogden knew that he was in for a mind-bending race against time – and danger. At the heart of it; a centuries-old Freemason conspiracy, and underneath the Vatican, a ticking bomb.
A vampire bomb.
Whatever happens, one thing is certain: the papacy will never be the same again.
Early praise:
“If Stephanie Meyer and Dan Brown had a love-child, and that child was Chuck Norris, that would be Spencer Harding” – The Chicago Sun-Times
“…Harding manages perhaps the most innovative use of an iPhone as a weapon ever conceived, whilst simultaneously making a comment on Apple’s draconian App Store policies. Brilliant!” – David Pogue, New York Times
“Hell. Yes.” – Tom Clancy
Excerpts:
Ogden was engaged in a friendly debate with his collegue, Wilbur Franks, when the mail arrived.
“I just think,” opined Wilbur “that using plurals in a crossword is unimaginative and lazy. ‘oh, I need a word that ends in ‘S’… I know, I’ll use a plural!’ Buy a fucking dictionary.”
“I disagree. By limiting your vocabulary to the singular form, you reduce the possibilities, and therefore, the difficulty of the…” Ogden stopped, noticing the return address on the envelope before him.
“What is it?” asked Wilbur
“This letter… it’s from Horatio LeSprat.”
Wilbur’s eyes widened. “I didn’t know you knew him.”
“I didn’t.”
Ogden tore open the envelope, inside was a crossword puzzle, half solved.
“Do you think…” wondered Wilbur, as they stared at it.
“7 down – ancient fraternal order. 3 across – plans made in secret. 12 down – nosferatu. 6 across – Paul’s church. 14 down… incendiary device…”
They looked at each other in shock for a moment, before exclaiming in unison.
“The Freemasons have planted a vampire bomb under the Vatican!”
***
Valerie was brandishing the flaming torch, casting light out into the gloomy catacombs. Demonic eyes shone back. The sputtering flame would soon go out.
“Do we… do we have anything to ward them off?” She whispered, for the first time a hint of fear noticeable in her usually cool and collected voice.
Ogden searched his pockets. “Only my iPhone… oh, if only Apple hadn’t denied the ultraviolet torch app for wasting too much power! It would have turned the screen into a vampire-burning machine! …but… wait! That’s it! Do you still have that letter opener?”
Valerie searched her pockets, and found the Pope’s letter opener with the microscopic riddle engraved on the blade. Ogden took it and pried open the casing of the iPhone. “If I can just…” he grunted as he fiddled with the circuitry “…reverse the transistors connected to the display… modulate the polarity of the current… that… that should do it!” he snapped the phone closed, and switched it back on. The screen was blank.
“It didn’t work!” moaned Valerie.
“No no, it did! The screen is now putting out only ultraviolet light – invisible to us… deadly to vampires!” to illustrate his point, Ogden pointed the screen out into the darkness, just as the torch finally spluttered out. The angry hissing of vampires in the dark, accompanied by an unpleasant smell somewhat like burning bacon, confirmed the success of his modifications.
Dispatches from the wilds of Poetania – Shiver
Can you really pretend
when the trees whisper
the wind chills
and the world outside your door
disappears behind a veil of oblivion
that you do not shiver?
Do you deny
that when your mind fills the shadows
with the predators from your deepest imagination
and makes every sound a footstep
that you look over your shoulder?
Or that you don’t – for fear you might be right?
Do you not feel
your muscles contract
and the tension ratchet
until you are little more
than a coiled spring of pure terror?
Did you ever really believe
that you stopped being afraid of the dark?
And do you really think
that light-bulbs will save you?
Dispatches from the wilds of Proseambique – Volume
The scholars came first; driven by a pure motivation for knowledge, they were careful, and deeply respectful. They disturbed nothing, worked silently, slowly making their way up and down the alcoves, poring over these tomes of forgotten lore, these unimaginably priceless works that filled the vast gaps between the shattered fragments of their knowledge.
In time, however, more came – they were less careful, less respectful. Books began to disappear. Still more came. They knew that their window of opportunity was short – that the library, inevitably, would be lost. The halls, once quiet, became crowded. The alcoves, once full of books, emptied.
Still more came; tourists, finally. Hurling themselves back through time to see the once magnificent repository of human knowledge, though it was, by now, stripped almost bare. Slowly, beneath the tread of a million soles that never should have been there, the library of Alexandria crumbled into dust.
Quietly ashamed of themselves, they blamed it on Caesar.
Dispatches from the wilds of Poetania – Shroud
The clouds roll in
dark, and thick
and cold.
They obscure the entire world,
drown it
disappear it
until my isolation is complete.
Mountains, valleys, houses, forests -
none are spared their chill embrace.
So thick, it comes right to my door
hovering
like a hesitant visitor
or looming disaster.
The world might have ended
a half-hour ago.
And here, in the cool shadows of my own creation
I cannot help but wonder
if I am trapped
in a metaphor
for my own life.
Dispatches from the wilds of Proseambique – “Clouds”
After three days, the phone cut out. Not that there was much use in it anyway; the calls all went the same way – the roads were still flooded, the rain showed no sign of letting up, &c., &c….
In a way, it was a nice change – a sort of holiday, really. One could not want for a better excuse to sit about the house and do nothing – there was no other option. It was a pity that the internet went with the phones, but he still had the television, and a healthy supply of books which had been waiting patiently on the shelves for years, looking down on his idle procrastinations with quiet, contemptuous despair.
On the fifth day, the rain was still pounding away; remorseless, end-of-the-world rain, the kind that batters your roof like a drunken friend at your door at 3 in the morning, the kind that inspired biblical authors and thoughts of Atlantis, the kind that usually you revel in, and delight at the fury of nature, and are saddened when, after an hour or two, it fades away and the world returns to normal.
Except, this time, the rain hadn’t faded away.
On the seventh day, during one of those rare periods when the rain relented just a little, switching from a furious deluge to a more pedestrian downpour, some Kookaburras found their way into the trees in his front garden. He was sitting on the verandah, staring out into the dim midday, letting his mind drift amongst the cascading sheets. The days were never brighter than twilight, now, and at night, with the moon and stars blotted out, there was only the impossible darkness of the ocean floor. He was stirred from this reverie by the laughter of the birds. It was as though they were laughing at him – it seemed knowing, malicious. Despite his cardigan, he shivered, and retreated inside, their cackles chasing him as he shut the door.
By the tenth day, he was giving serious thought to rationing his food. By this stage, he had worked his way through most of it, not imagining that the deluge would last so long. He’d watched the news; much more of it than usual was given over to the weather, and the weatherman had dispensed with his customary cheerfulness. He knew that the cloud stretched over five hundred kilometres, that it extended a little out to sea, where a vast column of evaporation was visible, feeding it without any signs of relenting. And though it hung, unmoving, over the coast, each day it grew longer, slowly but steadily encroaching upon the cities to the north and south.
By this stage there was talk of evacuation, but – as the newsreader explained with that impassive neutrality that could withstand the grimmest of news – with the roads flooded, and the rain falling too hard for helicopters, and tens, if not hundreds of thousands of people already trapped, it was an impossibility. There were stories of people taking boats out into the storm, and trying to float their way out, but those that didn’t find their boats filled after a scant few minutes rarely made it far before being washed out of their boats and drowned, or so soaked that they died of hypothermia. “Stay in your homes” was the newsreader’s Aesopian conclusion to the story.
By the twelfth day, the power went out. At least, he thought with a grim cheer, he needn’t worry about anything in the fridge spoiling.
By the fifteenth day, anything resembling food had been consumed, and his lunch had consisted entirely of a bottle of tomato sauce. He was not looking forward to the day he would have to tackle the mustard.
By the twentieth day, so his portable radio informed him, the cloud had covered the cities to the north and south. Many had fled, others had looted supermarkets, those who stayed behind were now trapped in the city.
On the twenty-third day, he longed for a jar of mustard to eat.
By the twenty-sixth day, the city streets had flooded, those left behind were now trapped in their houses and apartments, staring out at the newly Venetian streets. Storms were reported forming on the coasts of all the continents; most of the world’s population was now living under a cloud. By this stage, he spent all his time on the bed, wrapped in blankets, excepting the occasional trip to the bathroom.
On the thirtieth day, the radio announcer, who was trapped in his studio, related that he had lost contact with the outside world, and had no more news to tell, except that he expected the power would soon go out as well. He confessed that he was contemplating eating his producer. Not long after, the station disappeared in a wash of static.
By the thirty-fourth day, he was too weak to move, or think, or do anything but lie in his bed, and listen to the rain pounding on the ceiling.
On the thirty-eighth day, he heard the ceiling in the kitchen give way under the relentless barrage, and the house begin to flood. It didn’t merit much concern – the kitchen had long stopped being useful, and if anything it served only to taunt him.
On the forty-second day, his bed surrounded by water a foot deep, he fell into his final, exhausted sleep.
Outside, in the trees, the birds ruffled the water from their feathers, and watched as the end of the world pounded steadily on.
